Ford Ranger Maintenance and Repair

Comments

I am replying to my own question because I want to see how this works, but I still don't know where all that grease went, or if I should keep squirting more into that little hole in my front U-Joint. Also I still don't know how to grease the rear U-Joint!

What exactly does the EGR sensor do? Mine is a lease and I'm possibly interested in purchasing the vehicle cause the miles are low 27,000 highway on an 04' 4*4 extended cab V6 4.0 liter.

I too think I have a problem with the driveshaft. My complaints are to the "T" with other posts. It seems that I am stuck in 1st gear with an automatic. It is sporatically sluggish, and when I push the gas my foot gets tired -- the truck doesn't want to go.

My previous truck was an 02' 4*2 that had the same problem, but I didn't know what I now know, and I got rid of it. Both trucks were taken to the dealer -- I was complaining of tranny fluid loss, but a leak was never discovered. Then with this one the dipstick on a couple of occasions was nearly dry. I added some Mercon fluid, but when I took it back to the dealer they said it was overflowed. They took some out. I even had a tranny flush because in the process Ford had put a dye in the fluid to see if they could spot a problem. They said it wouldn't hurt the vehicle. I then got a recall notice from Ford saying that my vehicle had the wrong mixture from the factory and an additive was added. All in all do you think all my tranny problems are related? What can cause me to lose fluid? It even seemed a little burnt, but I have always driven Rangers and my mechanic told me not to worry Ford's all run a little hot, and that is why regular maintenance is crucial -- esp. the tranny. Every 30,000 I should have faithfully replaced the filter and fluid. What do you think? Last, I too have experienced a thump when I start my vehicle. It does seem to come from the rear. What could this be? Thanks in advance.

Most UJoints from the factory are sealed and have NO grease zerks. Usually, only replacement UJoints have a grease zerk. And, one pump from a hand grease gun, two at the very most, is all a UJoint needs for grease. More, and you will probably blow the seal.

If you have a 'hole', then a grease zerk has come out.

But, I don't think any of the above discussion really pertains to you. I don't think you are dealing with a UJoint. I think you have found a hole on the front 'slip joint' of the drive shaft. It is a splined joint where the front of the driveshaft slides into the tailshaft of the transmission. And, this slip joint can hold a lot of grease. A lot may not be needed, because it will just move out of the slip joint and be slung up on the vehicle and down on the road. If this is what your are greasing, you can probably stop after putting a lot in it. You probably haven't hurt a slip joint, since it does not have a seal at the rear, and overfilling will just come out as I said.

I hope I don't insult you, but I'm not sure you seem very knowledgable about what you are doing.

First, are you checking the tranny fluid the way the manual says it is to be checked? Usually, this is after driving and warming the vehicle up, with the tranny in park and the motor idleing. Not cold or not hot after a lengthly drive in hot summer weather - both may give bad readings. But, some vehicles are checked with the motor off.

If you did not check the fluid the correct way, the reading could be 'off' a great deal.

If you are losing tranny fluid, the main 2 ways I know about are 1) A leak. You should see this. Or, 2) The vacumn modulator has a busted diaphram and tranny fluid is being sucked up its vacumn line and burned in the motor. This usually only happens on older vehicles. A vacumn modulator usually does not give much trouble.

And, most important, this 2 year old truck with 27,000 miles is still under warranty. Why are you messing around with it? If you have tranny fluid loss, 'thumps', and 'stuck in 1st gear' - take it to a dealer, have all these problems documented on a warranty repair and make Ford fix them.

I owned an older 4L, and have test driven the new OHC 4L, and by no means did these motors feel like it was 'stuck in first gear'. (Or, do you mean it will not up-shift to second? If so, you really need to have Ford work on it, this sounds like a tranny problem.)

And, if it is having tranny problems, why would you even consider buying it at the end of the lease? Getting rid of a questionable vehicle is one of the better reason to have a lease in the first place.

I have been having a very hard time also bleeding the clutch on a 96 ford ranger. With the cap off the master and the bleeder valve is opened how long should it take for slave to fill? Any suggestions?

I have a 94 ranger with the 4.0. My therrmostat went, and I delayed in changing it(stupid). So, i was driving and i started to smell burning antifreeze. I pulled into a nearby gas station to put some in to get me home. When i open it the stuff that came out was rust colored. I put a jug in and went home. After changing the thermostat, and flushing the system, it still is running bad and i am getting a rediculous ammount of smoke from the exhaust, not to mention my loss of power. I have no idea what is wrong, and causing this. Any help is greatly appreciated.

You are absolutely correct. I got rid of my 02' because I felt there was something wrong. My 04' is experiencing the same type of problems.

In response to not knowing how to check tranny fluid, I don't take offense, but I do know how to check it. I leave the vehicle on not on a cold start nor after a lengthy trip, and I pull the dip stick up. I also do not mess around with my vehicle. I took it into Ford three or four times in six months. They treated me fairly, but couldn't find a problem. As I said in my first post they added the dye to try and find if and where it was leaking. If it is not leaking then it is burning. However, it does not appear like it is burning, rather disappearing. You read the posts too. It could be a small fix, which would make the vehicle very nice to own. This isn't a bad vehicle -- just not a great one. Also, I test drove the two vehicles before I got them. Noone can tell when a vehicle has 6 miles on it how it will feel when it has 26,000. This is what a forum is about. People display their problems and others "help" or describe theirs. The problem with the vehicle in first gear is that it just literally started. The automatic won't upshift to second gear. I have an appointment with the dealer. I appreciate the feedback.

If so, you possibly have a blown head gasket or cracked head. Either is pretty bad, with the cracked head much worse of course. Either might cause 'smoke', which is water/antifreeze getting into the cylinder and 'burning'.

I have a 1996 Ranger extended cab with only 10k miles on it. While driving in the rain and using the wipers, all of a sudden they stopped working. In addition, I then noticed that the speedometer wasn't working and the dome lite wouldn't come on either.

I stopped and checked all the fuses on the side of the dash board and all the fuses in the engine compartment and they are all GOOD. I thought I might have smelled burning wiresm but it soon went away and everything else works fine.

I can't see the relationship between these things since they would be on different fuses. Does anyone have any suggestions on where to start?

Help, please. My brother is working on our Dad's '89 Ford Ranger. They have replaced the head, which had tiny cracks in it, and it still won't start. Then he found some wire with the insulation gone and fixed that.

He can't retrieve any codes out of the computer module. He has used a code scanner and a multi-meter. We know this is probably a silly question, but he would like to triple-check himself before any more money is spent on this vehicle. I'm assuming this means the computer module is bad. Is this correct?

I have a 96 Ranger splash with the 4 liter engine./ While driving the other day in the rain, the wipers stopped working and I then noticed that the speedometer and odometer stopped working also. I then noticed the dome light would not come on. I think I smelled smoke and ALL the fuses test good. They must have some lousy design for all this to happen at once and the fuses not blow. :mad:

My opinion: I would not open it up to just replace the fluid. The fluid is a non-maintenance item, and the pump seals will usually fail at 10 years, 150,000 miles or so anyway and you will be replacing the whole pump.

If you still want different fluid in there, buy the cheapest turkey baster you can find and suction all you can get out of the fill hole, and refill. This will probably get 60%+ of the fluid out. Start it up for a couple minutes and have another go with the baster - this will further dilute the old fluid when you add more new.

Or, get a couple of feet of small plastic clear tubing, hold it in a U shape and fill with new fluid using a small funnel. Cork one end, then quickly stick the other end into the fill tube, to the bottom. Put the corked end lower, into a container, and syphon the fluid out.

We just bought a 2001 Ranger XL short bed for my teenage son. A guy at work has one just like it. I asked him what kind of mpg he got and he said his 2.3L gets 25mpg. I said wait a second. Ours has a 2.5L engine. So we opened the hood on his and sure enough his has a different engine all together. Ours has 8 spark plugs, two for each cylinder one on each side of the head. His has four plugs down the center and looks like a Mazda engine. When did this change occur? :confuse:

Midway in the 2001 model year they replaced the 2.5L SOHC 4cyl engine (commonly referred to as the lima as it was manufactured in lima Mexico) with the 2.3L DOHC 4cyl engine (commonly referred to as the duratec due to its dual overhead cam). You have the lima, your friend has the duratec. Both are good engines. :shades:

OK, I got the little syphon thingy and siphoned all the power steering fluid out of the reservoir and refilled it. In fact I did this 3 times and used up one bottle of power steering fluid. This brings me to the next question. Why is the stuff I am siphoning out "RED" and the stuff in the Prestone power steering bottle that says "For all Ford and General Motors products",(CLEAR!) Should the old stuff thats been in there for 6 years be Red? Does it have to be replaced by "Motorcraft" The Prestone fluid is clear. Is it OK to mix them?Thanks, Dan

Last night I got in my truck and noticed that my ABS light was flashing (15 times). I also had no dash lights. I read post #1940 where someone else was experiencing this same problem. One thing they had noticed was that they had no tail lights. Same is now true for me. Does anyone have an idea of what is wrong? I'd like to fix the problem myself if it's possible.

I have been driving my father in laws 87 Ford Ranger after the truck sat for a while. I replaced the tires, belts, and brakes. I had planned to replace the plugs and the plug wires. I also had the oil changed in it. After driving it around town on short trips- 5 to 8 miles I took it to the next town over about 15 miles. Speeds up to 65 miles an hour. Started to hear the lifters clicking after 14 or 15 miles. Looked down and I had no oil pressure and truck was heating up. Parked the truck immediately at my brothers house. Let it sit for about 15 minutes. I started it and the oil pressure was still not there and there was the clicking noise. Turned it off and got a ride home. Left the truck with my brother and he called about ten minutes ago after truck had sat there all day and said he cranked it and the pressure came up fine. Ran it about 5 minutes on idle and the noise started again and the pressure started to go down. Is this an oil pump problem or maybe engine sludge since the truck sat for a while?

Some Rangers of about this age, and 4 cylinder (I think) have a strange problem.

The gasket on the oil pan deteriates and pieces of it fall apart into the inside of the oil pan. After enough pieces get in there, the pieces will clog the opening or screen for the oil pump pickup. Enough to significantly slow down the oil flow and cause the problem you see.

The oil pan needs to be dropped and the crap cleaned off the oil pump pickup. And a new gasket of course. Or, I have heard about a process where people have tried to pump large amount of kerosene or some such solvent into the oil drain hole and attempt to wash out the gasket pieces.

I would try to drop the oil pan. I think it can be done on a 4 banger without pulling the engine. On V6's I think the motor has to be pulled, or at least lifted significantly.

i drive a 1990 Ford Ranger and i have had it for about 3 months. today i was drivin it and all of a sudden the tach shot up to 5000 RPM and then dropped until it read 0 RMP's. the truck will start and drive, but only goes about 10-15 MPH. if someone could help me, that would be fantastic

Most of us are getting murdered these days with gas prices and the poor mileage of our 4.0 4WD Rangers. Has anyone swapped out the 4.11 ring and pinion for a 3.55? If so, what were the mpg results and the effects on performance?HTanks, Steve G.

The rubber grease seals or boots or whatever they are called on my 2000 Ford Ranger lower ball joints are cracked and otherwise useless. A guy at the auto parts store told me that some people repair them with silicone rubber, so I gave it a shot I put big blob of rubber around the ball joint and let it dry and then bought a needle adapter for my grease gun and squirted grease in till I saw the rubber expand. Is there better quick fix for these things My Ranger has no zerks, Looks like someone would have come up with a wrap around rubber gadget to fix these cracked rubber seals.

Transmission began acting funny, all of a sudden completely lost clutch and couldn't shift (wouldn't disengage). Hadn't lost any fluid, no linkage problems (as there really are no linkages). But this was only momentary. Went back a couple days later, tried it again, clutch engages and disengages, but the rig shifts somewhat harder and less smooth. Been told the slave cylinder may be shot, and that I may as well junk the truck as it is not an easy fix as most other vehicles would be. Has anybody experienced similar problems? If so, what is it? Advice PLEASE!!!